Important Notice: As of Windows 8.1, we don’t recommend replacing the in-box Windows USB 3.0 stack with the Intel Windows 7 stack, as described in this post. This post is being kept for historical background, but we recommend working with your computer manufacturer and/or Microsoft on any remaining issues with the built-in Windows 8.1 USB 3.0 stack. Feel free to also comment below if problems remain but Plugable cannot offer technical support or take any responsibility for any issues this process may cause to your computer. Continue at your own risk.

One of the new features of Windows 8 is the built in XHCI host controller software and USB stack. While this brings some benefits like UASP support, there are some devices that currently don’t work with the Microsoft stack on the Intel USB 3.0 host controller. This can be fixed by forcing Windows to use the Intel USB 3.0 host controller drivers instead of the built in stack.

*NOTE* These instructions are only for machines with an Intel eXtensible Host Controller. Look for the Intel(R) USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller under Universal Serial Bus controllers in Device Manager.

First, download the latest driver package from Intel. It’s currently at version 1.0.6.245 and can be downloaded from the following link:

Intel(R)_USB_3.0_eXtensible_Host_Controller_Driver rev. 1.0.6.245

Once the download has finished, extract the .zip file to a known location.

Now download these two .inf files which have been modified to allow the Intel driver to install on Windows 8:

iusb3hub.inf

iusb3xhc.inf

We are going to replace the existing versions of these two files with the ones we just downloaded. Place the files in the following directory of the unzipped driver package and click yes when Windows warns that we are over writing a file with the same name:

Intel(R)_USB_3.0_eXtensible_Host_Controller_Driver\Drivers\Win7\x64\

This will update these two infs with the modified versions that will allow the Intel driver to install on Windows 8 when the Host Controller and USB hub drivers are updated.

To install the Intel drivers in place of the in box XHCI stack, we’ll have to temporarily disable Driver Signing Enforcement. To do this press the Windows key + R and in the run box type:

shutdown.exe /r /o /f /t 00

Now make the following selections to boot into the Start Up Setting Screen

Troubleshoot — Advanced options — Start Up Settings — Restart

Then, when the machine restarts, select “Disable driver signature enforcement”. Your machine will start with Driver signing enforcement disabled until the next reboot.

When the machine restarts, open Device Manager (win + r, devmgmt.msc). Double click on the entry for the Intel(R) USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller and select the Drivers tab. You should see that the driver provider is Microsoft.

Now click “Update Driver” and then select “Browse my computer for driver software”.

Next choose “Let me pick from a list of device drivers on my computer”.

Next, select “Have Disk”.

In the Window that pops up titled “Install From Disk” choose “Browse” and navigate to the location where we replace the original infs with the two modified .inf files we downloaded earlier. Select iusb3xhc.inf and click ok.

Windows will warn that the driver is not signed and will require you to confirm the installation.

Once the installation is complete, reboot the machine following the same procedure as above:

shutdown.exe /r /o /f /t 00

Now make the following selections to boot into the Start Up Setting Screen

Troubleshoot — Advanced options — Start Up Settings — Restart

When the machine starts, select “Disable driver signature enforcement”. Your machine will start with Driver signing enforcement disabled until the next reboot. Once logged in, open Device Manager (win + r “devmgmt.msc”) and locate the entry under Other devices for an Unknown device, to find the correct one, double click on the entry for the unknown device view the details tab. Make sure it has the VID_8086.

Once you have located the correct device right click on it and choose “Update Driver” Choose “Browse my computer”, Windows will ask you to identify the type of device, scroll down and select “Universal Serial Bus Devices”.

Click next, choose “Have Disk”, “Browse” and select the modified iusb3hub.inf that we placed in the Intel(R)_USB_3.0_eXtensible_Host_Controller_Driver\Drivers\Win7\x64\ folder earlier and click ok.

Again, Windows will warn about driver signing, when the install is finished, reboot your machine.

When it restarts look at the driver tab for the Intel(R) USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller and the Intel(R) USB 3.0 Root Hub to confirm that you are now running the Intel drivers.

To return to the built in Microsoft USB 3.0 driver stack, use the uninstall drivers button from the driver tab in device manager. When it’s finished, select the Action menu of Device Manager and “scan for hardware changes” Windows should find the Intel USB 3.0 host controller and re-install it using the built in Microsoft XHCI stack.

Thanks to Ekko for his original work on this. Please comment below if you have any corrections or refinements. We’d also love to have comments mentioning the problems you were having, and whether the Intel stack solved them for you. Thanks!

Related

334 comments on “Windows 8 and Intel USB 3.0 Host Controllers”

I have an Intel DZ77GAL-70K motherboard which I’ve had trouble getting the USB 3.0 drivers to work under Windows 8. I followed this guide, and now all of my USB 3.0 ports are working as intended.

However, I ran into one small issue when following this guide. When I got to the step of installing the two .inf files, the moment I installed the first file (iusb3xhc.inf), the USB Root Hub (xHCI) disappeared from the device manager. The only way to get it to display again was to uninstall the Intel(R) USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller and scan for hardware changes. It appeared again. So then I reinstalled the iusb3xhc.inf file, and once again the USB Root Hub (xHCI) disappeared. So then I uninstalled the Intel(R) USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller from the Device Manager one more time to get the USB Root Hub (xHCI) to appear, and tried to install the second .inf file (iusb3hub.inf) instead. I received a message that said that the device would not start. So then I installed the first .inf file (iusb3xhc.inf), however, this time after installing, all of the USB 3.0 devices appeared in the device manager. After that, all of my USB 3.0 ports were working.

I followed this guide, but ran into problems while there were two USB Root Hub devices and none were labeled (xHCI). Only one would allow me to install the modified .inf file. After boot I am still experiencing performance issues on my external monitors (lag, fuzzy image, short freezes and so on).

Bernie: I have another thread going with you about this 3.0 host controller issue. I also found EKKO’s solution, but couldn’t get the process to execute. Your instructions were terrific and I loaded the hack and this morning when I connected all my media with the 3.0 cable, voila, all is good in the universe. Multiple screens, LAN connection, 3.0 speeds etc so thanks!

Only thought on the directions is on the second file install, you say to go to the start settings menu by selecting “reset”. My system doesn’t do that, is says “restart” then I selected Option 7 to disable driver signing requirement. Don’t know if this will help anyone else.

Thanks this worked great. There’s an incompatibility with the default Microsoft Windows 8 driver when using a Flash Voyager GT USB 3.0 drive that caused it to not be recognized and return a “USB device not recognized” error. Installing the Windows 7 drivers provided by Intel using this hack fixed the problem.

Hi Matt – We’re not sure because there are no Plugable products involved there, but if you’re measuring with a normal Windows file copy, that can be the bottleneck. We use Atto (http://www.attotech.com/products/product.php?sku=Disk_Benchmark ) for ourdisk benchmarking – it may give you a better idea of whether you’re getting beyond USB 2.0 speeds at all.

Hi Bernie, since there is such a massive speed difference between USB 2 & 3, I think it’s safe to assume that I’m not getting USB 3 speeds simply by looking at the speed of the copy directly in Windows. Also, I’m copying to a SSD, so the USB port is more than likely the bottle neck.

I just purchased UD3000 to use with my new Lenova Yoga 13. Without this workaround, I could only run pluggable with USB2.0 port. After applying theworkaround, USB3.0 connection seems to work, but I noticed that system could not wake up from sleep at least once after installing the workaround. I have not used my system long enough to pin point the problem yet….

I Have an Asus K75VM notebook and a Kensington sd3500v USB 3.0 high-speed Dock. Before I only got the Kensington only working on my USB 2.0 ports, but after flowing the given instruction, everything (dual display 2 x 1920×1080, sound, 1Gbit networking) is working perfect on the USB3.0 ports.

Thanks Ekko and Jerome for the great job. Now waiting for Intel to release the next driver update for Windows 8, so we can update without the fuss.

I followed the instructions and got the following reply when I tried to update the driver: “The folder you specified doesn’t contain a compatible software driver for your device. If the folder contains a driver, make sure it is designed to work with windows for x64-based systems.” I have an ASUS Sabertooth motherboard with the Ivy Bridge Intel processor and my driver is ver 6.2.9200.16384. I also have two choices in compatible hardware at update time. The first is IntelR) 7 Series/C216 Chipset family USB Controller and the other is USB xHCl Compliant Host Controller. I chose the xHCl (but neither worked). The x64 folder contains the two new inf files, two man files, two cat files, and two sys files. Not sure what’s wrong.

Hi John – It’s not uncommon for motherboard makers to modify plug and play IDs of the chipset, so that the generic versions of drivers won’t install (only their specific versions). I don’t know for sure, but that may be happening here. If you have a Plugable product, just email your order # to support@plugable.com and we’ll find a different way to get around whatever problem you’re having with USB 3.0. Thanks!

Bernie, I love you! This solved all of my USB 3.0 issues on my Dell Inspiron 5520 laptop with Windows 8. Not Dell, MS or Intel could help me…

Just one note on the folowing:
“Once you have located the correct device right click on it and choose “Update Driver” Choose “Browse my computer”, Windows will ask you to identify the type of device, scroll down and select “Universal Serial Bus Devices”.”

I had to select the other option (forget what it is called) instead of “Browse my computer” to be able to select type of device.

Thank you very much for this post… you have saved me hours in data transfer!!

This is just fantastic !!! I thought i had wasted my $$ buying a new USB 3.0 Hub until i found this magic. I’ve got a Lenovo G580 I5 3210 and bought a Crucial 128G SSD.
Originally bought the SSD as a main drive but ran into problems that forced me to use the drive as external back up through my 2 USB 3.0 ports. I wanted more 3.0 ports but after doing the ‘winsat disk -drive (drive letter)’ command in admin command prompt, found that the hub was running 2.0 speeds.
I won’t mention the hubs brand but I know if i had heard about the Plugable Brand if would have gladly bought one.

Thank you very much for this “fix” … now i’m crossing my fingers that it works for a BlackMagic Intensity Shuttle for USB 3.0 I Intend to buy soon.

I have a question
I’m running Windows 7 x64 and after a recent Dell automatic update and restarting my system, all of my 3.0 USB ports stopped working properly. They won’t recognize any devices plugged into them, but they will light up and I can hear them running. If I plug the devices into 2.0 USB ports, they work perfectly fine.
Prior to the Dell update, my devices all connected to and worked perfectly fine when plugged into 3.0 or 2.0 ports.

However, when trying to install the JPJJT drivers, it first tells me “This computer does not meet the minimum requirements for running this software”
Then it asks if I’d like to try to reinstall it using recommended settings and when I choose yes, that’s when it says “This operating system is not supported”.

So although I’m running Windows 7 x64 and those are the correct drivers for the 3.0 USB Chipset drivers, it won’t let me install the files. It does show in Device Manager that there are 2 Generic USB Hubs, Intel(R) 7 Series/C216 Chipset Family USB Enhanced Host Controller – 1E26 and the Intel(R) 7 Series/C216 Chipset Family USB Enhanced Host Controller – 1E2D, as well as USB mass storage device and 2 USB Root Hubs.

If I download the USB 3.0 Extensible Host Controller Driver that you linked and replace the two .inf files – then in Device Manager, If I select any of the USB Controllers, choose properties, driver, update drivers, browse my computer for driver software, let me pick from a list of device drivers, Have Disk, browse, select the •iusb3xhc.inf files, click OK – it tells me to select the device driver I want to install for this hardware and then it gives me options to choose from Intel(R) USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller and 3.0 Root Hub in addition to a few other USB drives.

If I select the Intel(R) USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller and click next, it pops up with an update driver warning message.
“Installing this device driver is not recommended because Windows cannot verify if it is compatible with your hardware. If the driver is not compatible, your hardware will not work correctly and your computer might become unstable or stop working completely. Do you want to continue installing this driver?”

I’m just wondering if doing this or perhaps going about it a different way would allow me to install the 3.0 USB extensible host controllers so I can get my 3.0 USB ports working again. Any suggestions or advice would be appreciated.

Just to update anyone who is interested in case anyone else reading this post has experienced the same issue as myself on Windows 7 x64.
I called Dell support and had a 1 hour 40 minute DellConnect session with a Dell agent trying to fix the 3.0 driver issue remotely. Long story short, after he tried practically everything possible – multiple drivers – uninstalling drivers – renaming – reverting – checking info against Dell’s drivers under their FTP etc.. etc….
The agent came to the conclusion that although the driver listed on their website says A01 in the file extension, once it downloaded it showed A00 which was causing the incompatibility and other issues where it popped up with a windows error telling me that “my computer does not meet the minimum requirements for the software”.
So the agent took some screenshots of various information and I was told he would submit it for review to his department head. That I would hear back in 2-3 business days and they would send me an e-mail with a link for the correct drivers for my OS.

Sounds like BS to me and it sounds like I’ll get an e-mail with a link to drivers that won’t work or they’ll tell me some other BS giving me the run-around. I’m not the first person to have this problem on Windows 7 x64 – so why would the link on their website be directed to a file download that does not match the file name. I’ll most likely end up using a System Image Backup and reverting my desktop back 2 months which should fix the problem.

I found this page because I’m only getting USB 2.0 speeds (40 Mbps tops for USB 3.0 drive in USB 3.0 port) in a new Dell E6530 laptop with Win 8. Also, DM shows both at the top level an Intel WiUSB USB-IF xHCI USB Host Controller with the error message “This device is not working properly because Windows cannot load the drivers required for this device. (Code 31).” The current driver is Intel ver 1.0.20.12466. In addition, under the USB category, there is Intel USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller that has the Microsoft driver. My first question is whether this configuration is a problem, namely two sets of xCHI host controller drivers?

Beyond that, when I try to follow the instructions on this page, when I install the Intel xHCI driver to replace the Microsoft one, the driver looks like it is installing, but afterwards, DM shows that the driver is still the Microsoft one and not the Intel one. Also, I never get a warning about unsigned errors. So, for some reason, the driver installation is failing.

Never mind on the installation question. I wasn’t following the instructions correctly. I have the Intel drivers now installed, however I’m still limited to 2.0 speeds (40 MBytes/second max.) between USB 3.0 port and Patriot USB 3.0 USB drive.

I used your solution, which was easy to follow and the only option out there it seems currently, so thank you!

However, I’m finding that sometimes my port is reverting to USB 2 speeds. If I perform a restart then everything seems to work fine and I’m getting 100 MB/s speeds again. I was wondering if anyone else is experiencing this problem?

Thanks for this. Good clear instructions. I couldn’t get my Kensington USB 3.0 Docking Station to work at all under Windows 8. With the Intel host controller drivers it’s been working nicely for a couple of weeks now.

A huge thank you to you guys for figuring out and publishing this fix. I have successfully used for the last year an Acer Aspire 5755G i7-2670QM with Windows 7, which happened to have the Renesas USB 3.0 chipset recommended by Blackmagic, with a Blackmagic Intensity Shuttle to capture high definition video for live streaming.

Then I needed a backup and bought the successor, an Acer Aspire V3-571G i7-3630Q, which of course now has W8 and the Intel eXtensible chipset. Plug in the Intensity Shuttle and after a few seconds the laptop just crashes. I thought that I had a pig in a poke.

Then I found your fix. I got it wrong the first time, selecting the Hub instead of the XHCI, I think, when there is a choice at one point when you click “Update Driver” the first time, a choice which is not mentioned in your instructions. I lost the USB 3.0 device completely and had to go back and Restore to an earlier state.

The second time I followed the instructions more carefully and have since had the Intensity Shuttle running for a couple of hours without issue, and am very, very happy. More soak testing to follow.

Incidentally, there appears to be an Intel eXtensible USB 3.0 Windows 8 driver published on 14 January at http://www.station-drivers.com/page/intel%20chipset.htm but not unfortunately for an i7 series 3 processor. I did try this first on its own but it just said not compatible.

Actually, it does work. If you open “Device Manager” and then open both “Intel USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller” and “Intel USB 3.0 Root Hub”, you will see, under the “Driver” tab, that the Driver Date and Driver Version are incorrect. However, if you now click on “Driver Details”, you’ll see that the file version is the right one.

To solve this discrepancy, open the “iusb3xhc.inf” and “iusb3hub.inf” files and, in the “DriverVer=…” line, update the date and version (it should now looke like this: DriverVer=1/8/2013,1.0.7.248).

Note: you should modify this files before following all the instructions on this web page. I didn’t, and then I couldn’t find the “Unknown device” entry, so I had to reinstall windows 8 and do it all over again. No biggy.

Correction: I didn’t have to reinstall windows 8. I simply uninstalled the Intel USB 3.0 eXtensible driver and allowed windows 8 to reinstall the Microsoft driver. Than, I repeated the whole process. Now, everything is working fine.

I.m having the same problems on a Dell L702X after upgrading to Windows 8 from Windows 7. Only problem is, in the device manager I have “Renesas USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller – 0096 (Microsoft)” in place of the “Intel(R) USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller”

Any ideas if this fix will work or if there is anything else I can do?

That satisfying sound of Windows finally recognising my USB 3.0 stick, thank you to all involved with this – I can now sleep.

Just one thing that as I was carefully following the steps almost tripped me up is in this one:

“Once you have located the correct device right click on it and choose “Update Driver” Choose “Browse my computer”, Windows will ask you to identify the type of device, scroll down and select “Universal Serial Bus Devices”.”

After you choose “Browse my computer…” you actually have to select “Let me pick my device from a list” etc before Windows presents you with the list of device types to choose from.

I know it’s mentioned above and not a biggie it just threw me a little and maybe any other noobs following this to the letter.

Hi, I am having same problem as Will who posted on 19th Jan. My Laptop is L502X and also has the “Renesas USB 3.0 oneXtensible Host Controller – 0096 (Microsoft)”. Will this solution work or is it only for Intel ?

Hi,
Great workaround, but I have a slight problem. Everything worked fine until I shut down, when I restarted again the two usb 3.0 ports on my laptop wouldn’t work again.
Followed the instructions again, worked perfectly again until I restarted and the same problem again.
is there something I am doing wrong?
I have a Lenovo G580 laptop 64 bit.

Thank you Jerome, but i wanna to tell you that in my case it worked for a while but something weird happened, apperantly it doesnt work anymore, i repeat the steps described it worked again, but after two days, it stops working again. So anyone have any idea of what might be happening to me. I would appreciate any help.

A great guide! The best I could find in the entire internet. For over a week I have been struggling to make my new Corsair Voyager GT 3.0 USB flash memory work with a Lenovo Thinkpad T430s with Windows 8 (I mean in USB 3.0 mode). I’ve tried almost everything (incuding complete reinstallation of the system) and nothing worked. Until I found this article.
I did everything as described. And the thumbdrive finally works!!!
Thank you!
W.

Please say more about what sorts of specific issues this procedure resolves. It’s a rather scary workaround – disabling driver signing is NOT a step which should be taken lightly, in my opinion.

Also a bit more followup would be handy. As of this writing, Intel have revved that driver again and their website lists 1.0.7.248 as current.

Since I am not sure if this will resolve the issue I’m facing (USB3 sticks from PQI and Team Color Turn not formatting properly), it’s not worth the possible unintended consequences. I’m not trying to be stuffy about this, but as a sysadmin I’ve been burned a few too many times by this sort of thing.

This absolutely worked for me, so thanks!
Remains to be seen if the fix holds or I get the same problems as some others.
I’d be interested in knowing more about Bryan’s post here above mine.
Is it worth looking for the newer Intel drivers?

My computer could detect my USB 3.0 devices just fine, but the problem was that i could not send files to my external hard drive, though i could send files from the external hard drive to the computer (these would be sent at a low speed, approx 20 MB/s). After doing this, at first my computer couldnt detect the external hard drive at all…so i went into the Device manager and found that the drivers for startup of the external hard drive were now lacking (this didnt show up before i followed this guide) so i installed them and now everything is working fine. Lets just hope it keeps working since some people have said that it has stopped working after a few days.

I just want to say thank you. Very legible guide. My issue wasn’t with speed… it wouldn’t recognise my 3TB external at all! After this, it does and runs fast. The USB2 ports still don’t recognise it though, but I don’t mind that. I wish Intel would just recognise the problem and get the ball rolling on a true driver.

I also had the issue of the drivers stop working after a short while. I have found that I was able to right click on each of the .inf replacement files in the Intel(R)_USB_3.0_eXtensible_
Host_Controller_Driver\Driver\Win7\x64\ folder and then click install. Windows 8 confirmed it had installed these drivers again without any warnings. My USB 3.0 is still working properly as of this comment. No need to go through the entire installation procedure as documented by Ekko. This worked for me and maybe worth a try for you.
Nevertheless, thanks to Ekko for his post and procedure without which none of this would be possible.

I just got a new Toshiba laptop with Windows 8. I have a Rocketfish bluetooth adapter that works fine on my old laptop with Vista. It worked for a couple days on the Toshiba but windows did an update a couple days ago and now it doesn’t work on startup. It does work if I plug it in once the computer has started or unplug and plug back in. At first it would turn off in sleep mode but I have gotten it to start back up after resuming from sleep. When I shut down completely and start the computer the next day, I get the error 43-the usb device last connected malfunctioned.

I was going to try the Intel win 7 driver solution but I’m not sure if it is for the same problem or if there is a setting I have to change. After enabling sleep and charge mode on the laptop, that made it start working after sleep mode. I also checked Toshiba’s site and there is a bios update so wondering if I should try that first. If anyone can give me some suggestions, I’d appreciate it. I should also mention that the morning after the update I got the message “driver power state failure”, I also got this yesterday after a restart. I’m thinking it has something to do with the driver not starting after reboot so the computer doesn’t recognize the usb port. Should I just use the win7 drivers and see what happens? I’ve had this computer only 5 days now.

Thanks for the fast reply but I downloaded the drivers last week when I first set up the adapter and they are the same ones. Rocketfish is BB but on their site it directs you to Broadcom to download the drivers. They have been uninstalled/reinstalled multiple times now. Should I try the bios update? I don’t think Rocketfish will be any help, I was on the phone with BB geek squad yesterday for over 2 hrs.

Ok, I went ahead and called Rocketfish and even though they have a link to the drivers they said it doesn’t work with windows 8. They were surprised I got it to work at all initially. When I got home and started it up today it started up fine and the light is on but my bt mouse is back to not working again. Problem is I’ve looked online and don’t see one that is specifically for win 8. I only want to use it for occasionally connecting my mouse when the laptop is hooked up to the tv w/hdmi. I don’t use it all the time. Does anyone know of an adapter that works with 8?

I’ve got a Dell Inspiron14z and a Kensington sd3000v, OS is Windows 8 64bit. I tried to reboot the system in different ways, but I didn’t get the “Start up settings” option. The menu shows the “Uefi settings” instead, so I am not able to choose the “Disable driver signature enforcement” option. Any suggestion?

The Intel USB 3.0 controller is the only one I AM NOT having an issue with.. having issues with AMD & Renesas USB 3.0 controllers (after plugging in Corsair VOYAGER slider USB 3.0 flash drive, Windows says USB Device Not Recognized/Driver Error). Can anyone confirm if this solution and these modified *.inf files can be used with Renesas USB 3.0 controller?

I have the same problem, i`m with a Lenovo Yoga 13 and iGO Iomega 3.0, i cant send any files to this HD and some times it do not connect. When i try to update force the update windows says that it has already the newest drive and did not let me update it, i`m doing some thing wrong or i have to do another thing?

Hi, have same problem with asus ultrabook, but when i get to install downoladed drivers (after rebooting system) windows says that i already have actual drivers set and i can’t do anything more about it. The problem is still there.

Thank you for this wonderful fix. I used driver version 1.0.8.251. For those having a problem with the XHCI drivers reverting to the Win 8 stack version, I would suggest you “disable” Windows 8 auto-driver updates. Thanks again! Oh, BTW, you can easily overwrite the driver version in both of the .inf files (downloaded from this website) to match the actual version you downloaded from Intel. That way, they will display correctly in device manager. The information will be either on line 24 or 25 and here is what I inserted to match my current driver version: DriverVer=03/30/2013,1.0.8.251

Just a follow-up to my previous post (which should be right above this one). Ok, so everything was working fine for a while; however, on my last test, my USB 3.0 device was not recognized as such and it ended up on one of the USB 2.0 root hubs. So I checked my device manager and discovered that I now had “two” XHCI root hubs. The first one, labeled Intel(R) USB 3.0 Root Hub has the Win 7 drivers that were installed via this guide; however, the second one, labeled USB XHCI Root Hub appears to be the original one because it still has the Win8 stack drivers. Anyway, I’m not sure whether it was left there as some sort of duplicate hub or if it just magically came back on its own. So, hoping that it was just left there and was (somehow) the cause of my recent problem, I simply deleted it and, since doing so, I have done multiple reboots and insertions of USB 3.0 devices and they were all correctly identified as such. With that said, I’m going to keep watch over the next few days and I’ll report back if there is another issue.

This is my final follow-up to my previous posts and (unfortunately) I have to report that my intermittent detection problem has returned so I must conclude that this procedure did not work for me but I had fun trying to fix anyway. However, I am glad to hear that it did work for many!

It seems that the hub reset (causing USB 3.0 speed to become slow again) stems from Win8 shutting down/booting up from the pagefile (they call it Fast Startup), and the option is turned on by default. To turn it off:

1) Press the Start key and type “shutdown” (without quotation marks);
2) On the right hand side of the screen, click on “Settings”;
3) On the left hand side of the screen, click on “Change what the power buttons do”;
4) In the window that will open, click on “Change settings that are currently unavailable”; in the following dialog box, enter the administrative password (if applicable) and click “OK”;
5) Make sure the box that says “Turn on fast startup (recommended)” is ticked off;
6) Click “Save changes”.

Additionally, Jedster’s comment (dated April 8, 2013) is most useful, as right clicking both modified .inf files and choosing “install” seems to boost up the USB 3.0 speed some more.

Won’t work with mine MSI B85-G43.
When I install both iusb3xhc.inf ord iusb3hub.inf all usb ports literally stop working.

After doing the procedure for the first .inf I rebooted with provided command, installed the remaining .inf all via keyboard. Rebooted again and sitll getting USB 2.0 speeds.
Already tried modifying myself the newest drivers but the same happens.

I got to the part where I run “shutdown.exe /r /o /f /t 00” but all that happens is that a command prompt appears briefly, then disappears. There’s no menu for me to choose the Start Up options. Does anyone know what I can do to fix this?

Hi Jacob – Try typing “cmd.exe” at search, then right click and “run as admin”. Then, once the command window is open, run the full shutdown command there. That’ll keep the window from disappearing. Reply back if any errors are reported. Thanks!

Thanks, that did the trick! However, after installing the first driver (iusb3xhc.inf) and rebooting, no “Unknown Device” shows up in device manager. I just see an error on my USB 3.0 that it couldn’t start. It also doesn’t show up when I enable hidden drivers.

I’m sorry for having so much trouble, I’m usually pretty good with computers but I guess I’m just no good at this.

Works on my Samsung XE700T1C, thanks!
I had an ongoing issue where plugging any device into the USB 3.0 port caused the Client Server Runtime process to hog the CPU. I couldn’t find an answer for weeks, even a complete rebuild failed to resolve the problem – then came across this – first four devices after following this post have been successful.

Notice to all ASRock motherboard owners. ASRock has recently released a ton of BIOS updates and the one that is intended to “improve memory compatibility” just solved my USB 3.0 detection problem on my Intel-based motherboard. Not sure I can make a direct correlation from the description to my actual fix but all my detection problems were associated with USB 3.0 flash drives. Good luck and check it out.

Excellent, thanks for the comprehensive instructions. I have spent the last month trying to get my Kaiser Baas TVStick Dual working on my new Dell Inspiron 17R (with only USB3.0 ports). I have tried changing every driver I could think of, plus bought a USB3.0/USB2.0 hub manager, all without any success. This fix did the job perfectly. Thanks again !

After installing the first driver (iusb3xhc.inf) and rebooting, no “Unknown Device” shows up in device manager. I just see an error on my USB 3.0 that it couldn’t start. It also doesn’t show up when I enable hidden drivers.

Great work around! Fixed my issue using a USB 3.0 thumb drive that I haven’t been able to use on this laptop since I got it. However it comes up every time saying there is an issue with it and wants to scan it to fix it but I just choose continue without scanning and it seems to still be working ok. Not sure if anyone else has this issue.

If still having problems… I also updated the 2 inf files to include the correct driver version and date version so I opened them up in a text editor and edited the date/driver version on the line “DriverVer=”…

Intel’s download page has been updated with new drivers again last week, which I think no longer match the INFs here 🙁 I attempted to update them myself, but ended up with USB not working at all until I uninstalled the USB controllers remotely and it put the MS ones back. 🙁

Hi Coolookoo, have you any more advice for Windows 8 4th generation USB 3.0 installers? I have it working on a 3rd generation W8 Acer laptop using what I thought was the original Ekko/Plugable workaround, though at some point I seem to have switched back to the Microsoft Host Controller driver 31/5/2013 6.2.9200.16628 and Root Hub driver 03/05/2013 6.2.9200.16604.

On my latest attempt to install to an Acer 4th generation laptop I followed your advice above as closely as possible, and went back to Ekko’s original script to make sure I wasn’t missing anything. I have ended up with Intel Root Hub driver 12/09/2013 2.5.1.28 (but with the device location showing as zero) and Host Controller driver 12/09/2013 2.5.1.28.

I edited the two inf files according to your instructions and to the original instructions by Ekko, adding NTAMD64 where he advised. I am guessing the problem is the “Location 0” in the Root Hub properties. How could I change that?

The result is that a Blackmagic Intensity Shuttle HD video capture device is recognised, but I get no pictures and start to get a repeated “device removed” sound when I try to use it. It does work correctly on the W8 Acer 3rd generation laptop.

this cause my pc to disable my USB ports, and I had to perform a system restore because the PC wouldnt recognize my mouse + KB when I restarted (couldnt reboot because the mouse+kb wouldnt work) and it freaked me out

Thnaks for posting this, very interesting reading. I came across this page just now while trying to upgrade my PC from Win 7 to Win 8, but the upgrade check flagged a warning that my Intel USB3 eXtensible Host Controller drivers are too old. I’m not really familiar with all this XHCI stuff yet, so am a bit unclear of the implications if I just update these drivers to the latest version without first modifying them as per the instructions above. Can I just upgrade to Win 8 then, or is it possible some of my USB3 devices won’t work correctly (I only have one currently, which is a flash drive).

Last night though, I upgraded from Win 7 > 8 > 8.1, having first benchmarked my USB3 flash drive. Following the upgrade, USB3 performance was actually marginally better than in WIn 7. All I did prior to upgrading was install the latest (standard) version of the Intel eXtensible HC drivers, i.e. without the two modified files in this article.

I have done as the article said but the minute I did the first step/ update all USB ports stopped working and now can’t reinstall. The ports work as windows starts up. I can get in to the boot and setup menus so F2 & F12 at the very begging start process. Anyone have any suggestions so I can complete the setup please?

i have hp sleekbook 15. when i plugin my usb 3.0 external drive on windows 8 x64 it doesnt pick it up at all. however if i plug it in usb 2.0 port, it works fine, i tried the method given here but of no use so far. all other usb 2.0 devices run ok with the usb 3.0 port except my usb 3.0 external hardisk. kindly help

Having successfully used Ekko’s original workaround detailed at top on an Acer Aspire 15″ Windows 8 laptop i7-3630QM; and then the same workaround with Coolookoo’s additional suggestions above on an Acer Aspire 17″ W8 laptop i7-4702MQ; I have now updated another brand new Acer Aspire 17″ W8 i7-4702MQ to Windows 8.1 and found that, once I had loaded the software for a Blackmagic Intensity Shuttle USB 3.0 HD video capture box, it worked perfectly without touching the Microsoft drivers for the Intel USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller or Root Hub.

Some months ago, the first time I tried the Blackmagic Intensity Shuttle USB 3.0 with the i7-3630QM laptop, before implementing the workaround, the machine shut down a few seconds after plugging it in; it is a demanding device. This time with W8.1 and a 17″ laptop with two USB 3.0 ports, not only is the HD video input working, but so is a second identical Intensity Shuttle USB 3.0. With careful manipulation of its own Control Panel I have two HD video sources showing up in Wirecast streaming software, and have been happily cutting back and forth between them for the last few hours.

It remains to be be seen whether it will all work again tomorrow, but for now the answer is, yes, USB 3.0 appears to be fully implemented out of the box in Windows 8.1.

I have also tried a simple Windows copy test with a 4GB file from and to an external 2.5″ WD MyPassport 1TB HDD, averaging transfer rates of 84 MB/s and 75 MB/s respectively.

I did this back in April and now I updated to 8.1 hoping that Microsoft might actually have fixed these issues after a little more than a year, but have they bollocks!
Pretty rubbish not to have fixed it yet.
Anyway I just used the same original files from here, ran through the procedure and it worked fine for me on 8.1.

i tried the files for 3 times including after a clean windows install. still not working. my external disk is not showing. when i revert to MS drivers, i get the external drive but when i try to copy some files, the disk is just freezeing and i have to eject it manually.
usb 2.0 port is working great.

I have a MSI GT70 0NC (which is 3rd gen) and a Patriot supersonic Magnum 64GB and a Sandisk Extreme 16GB. My Windows 8 install had the MS stack and while the Patriot managed good speeds (around 40 – 70 to higher) with a range of materials the Sandisk always topped out at 33MB/s. Since I’m always looking for something faster, I flipped the stack to the Intel W7 drivers as per the faultless instructions! On a test using lots of smaller files this boosted the Sandisk to 45MB but shrank the Patriot to 7-14MB/s! (using fastcopy). Totally bizarre. On large >2GB file transfers the Patriot went back to 120MB/s whereas the Sandisk wandered along at 45MB. Really different implementations! I wanted the best compromise and mostly use the Patriot stick so I flipped back to the MS stack. To be sure I hadn’t broken anything I retested and got the same numbers as pre-flip, but the large file transfers seem to have improved for some odd reason with the Sandisk – the MS stack is giving me 45MB/s there, with the Patriot back to 70MB/s. Lesson? Fantastic instructions, a hopeful idea, and mileage varies. (and maybe upgrade to windows 8.1) I’d recommend the soft DevMan by nir sofer to clean away all the stray hidden usb devices before doing this.

when select the iusb3xhc.inf file I am getting message ” The folder you specified doesn’t contain a compatible software. If the folder contains a drive, make sure it is designed to work with Windows for x64-based-system” have i done something wrong?

I tried this because my external (USB 3.0) Seagate hard drive will periodically disconnect, and the only way to reconnect is a reboot. After upgrading to the newer drivers via these (very well-expressed) instructions, though, my system no longer saw the Seagate drive as a “disk drive”. It appeared in “Devices and Printers” as a device, unknown type, but not as a disk drive. I had to revert to the older Microsoft drivers, and it appears as a device again.

I also have printer, scanner and mouse/keyboard connected via USB 3.0 ports, and they appeared to be fine with the Intel drivers.

Curious if anyone else is experiencing this. I’m pretty sure the drivers installed OK, since the other USB 3.0 devices still appeared, but I wonder if these drivers have some sort of incompatibility with this Seagate drive. It’s an “Expansion Desk”, 3TB.

Took the advice at the top of the thread and stopped trying to fix this myself in Windows 8.1. As of maybe a week or two ago, the drive stays online. I don’t think it was anything I did — I presume a recent Windows Update fixed the problem. Now my external drive stays connected for days at a time.

Interesting. My Seagate Expansion 1TB worked OK with the MS drivers in 8.1. My Vantec HX4 and my Logitech HD 920 webcam (USB2!) did not. Ended up installing Win7 for sanity between that and other issues.

Another consideration:http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2900614
“Some USB devices do not recharge in Windows 8.1”
“This issue may occur because of power management improvements that are introduced in Windows 8.1. These improvements help reduce power consumption and extend the battery life of mobile computers. If the USB device presents itself as a Human Interface Device (HID) and there is no app accessing the device, Windows suspends the device.”

Big thx for this HowTo. I just used it for my System with Gigabyte GA-Z77-D3H on Win8 Pro x64. Time will tell if the disconnect problem is solved by this now. But I still notice a bandwith drop of my USB Wifi dongle connected to USB 2.0 frontpanel (using mainboard USB 2 connector) when I connect an USB 3.0 flash drive to the frontpanel’s USB 3 Port (connected to mainboard USB 3 connector).

Attempting to do this on my Surface Pro. Got as far as updating the driver, and Windows 8.1 keeps telling me that it didn’t find any drivers that work for my hardware, and there doesn’t seem to be anyway to force the over-write. Yes, I rebooted and disabled driver signing. Any ideas?

Thanks but actually I already did but unfortunetly my last system restore was after i accidentally delete intel(r) usb 3.0 extensible host controller- 0100 (microsoft) (my bad). Is it possible to download manually the intel(r) usb 3.0 extensible host controller- 0100 (microsoft) ??or Maybe there is another way??

After looking at many pages, and solve the problem as they said them, the end does not work or I do not inciaba bien.Me usb port to download this driver ETRON that said it was for qindos 8 and 8.1 and works great.
Here I leave the link.https://app.box.com/s/z93vcmqumneogigct8bq

Guys the problems with windows 8 and windows 8.1 are normally the usb 3.0 drivers. Intel have not posted windows 8 drivers for series 7 and series 8. You need to modify the windows 7 drivers with other inf files. I have done the job for you so you can manually install the drivers.

This is great Andre. Thanks for doing this and making it available. I still have a problem however. I’ve got a Surface Pro 2 and when I go to Advanced Startup to temporarily disable Driver Signing, my mouse and keyboard stop working and I cant make the startup selection. The system shuts down and I need to manually restart. The temporary suspension of driver signing never takes effect and I can’t install the new drivers. Any ideas?

Many thanks Andrew , after days of trying to make my android phone recognized in fastboot usb mode(usb3 or usb2), under windows 8.1 pro X64, with intel 8/c220 extensible usb3
your modified drivers made the difference ! now it’s working, thanks for sharing your work 🙂

The problem still exists for me. I have huge connecting problems with my WD external drive on the USB 3.0 port with Windows 8.1 on an Acer notebook. The Intel USB 3.0 host controller driver is by Microsoft which seems to cause the problems. The newest Intel drivers are version 1.0.9.254, but won’t install because my system hasn’t got the requirements (odd error message).
The Dropbox links to new drivers seem only to be HTML documents. Any ideas, guys?

Coolookoo is – seriously- my hero. I have a Lenovo y510 ideapad, and there was no way I could make my intensity shuttle work. But his diver-switcheroo worked like a charm! The shuttle is working FLAWLESSLY with ustream.

In my case, the problem was related to USB 3.0 cable. That short cable I’ve got with my goflex1TB drive. The cable worked fine with my old Asus laptop 3.0 port and my desktop PC, but it was not stable (slow transfer and disconnections) with brand new Lenovo Flex laptop. I’ve slender a lot of time to figure out what the problem is, but only when I’ve replaced cable it solved the problem.

I have a DELL 5737 and I updated the latest (A06) bios today. I have tried installing several different drivers using Jeromes original method and also using the driver linked by Cookoo. None of them work. I have an Intel i5 4200u processor so I am not 100% sure which Intel driver I should be downloading (ie 3rd generation, 4th generation, etc). All the ones I tried will result in an Error (Device can’t start (10) message.

I have gone back to Microsoft version but I need my BM intensity Shuttle USB 3 to work with this laptop. The Shuttle works fine on my HP desktop. If anyone has any details on the specific Intel drivers I need to install on this Dell laptop, I would be most greatful!!

Thanks for all the helpful posts and comments above. Hoping I can solve this so I can stream using Xsplit and HighSchoolcube.com .

** Update ** 1) Was using the wrong chipset USB driver. I finally downloaded 8th Generation and followed instructions above and the update worked without any problems. It did NOT solve my problem, but I was able to update to the Intel USB 3 driver.

When I plug in my Blackmagic Shuttle USB 3.0, my laptop recognizes the device but the video is still not being passed thru to the laptop using Blackmagic Media Express software. I have a powered USB 3 hub that will be in tomorrow and several people have said on various forums that this solved their video communication problem. I am sure hoping it solves mine!!

Thank you very much. This fixed the problem where Win 8 64bit & fastboot could not get the token on my HTC EVO 4G LTE. But I wonder if it would be easier to do this fix by copying the new files over the old files of the same name (renaming if required) and then doing a hard reboot.

Why doesn’t the author of this post no longer recommend this solution with windows 8.1? I see other folks using it, with some modifications. How is the average user to know which USB 3.0 devices won’t crap out on their windows 8.1 machines? I have three usb sticks, all purchased at the same time. One of them won’t work with MS drivers but work fine with the intel.

I’m not a lazy dude, but damn, we might as well be asking the average user to install linux, because the above instructions will be greek to them.

if your USB devices are running, but youre still having some problems then it could be just as simple as this:

Windows 8.1 comes with a new power saving feature, which just might prevent the USB 3.0 devices from getting enough power to work properly.

I can only see the menu in german- i will try to translate as good as possible 😉

Goto the energy options (usually right click on the battery sign in the taskbar and choose energy options) and switch to “Full Power (?)” Mode. Mine was in “balanced” mode and my USB 3.0 device just would only work as 2.0! After the switch to full power mode, its working as 3.0.

Well, these assholes at MS just stole one day of my life. And the best thing is, they wont tell you about this ^^

I have had the same(?) problem win7.8,8.1. 8.1 worst. Not intel usb 3 controller, Renesas, Asmedia. None of these hacks seem to work for me. Not to mention: Most tooo complicated for my Computer skills. Windows randomly runs into problems with usb host controllers, inactivating them. Painful to log in or repair without neither keyboard or mouse function! Device manager disable-enable cycle usually works, but often the device just disappears and ” scan for hardware changes” randomly works -or not. People seem to tout victory after few successful reboots, however, in my opinion too early. Hate to throw away fine Computer, but this really makes it unusable. Please do not suggest driver update or reinstallation of the operating system, these options are nonsense after three OS upgrades. And again, these complicated hacks do not seem promising.

Just used this guide, even though the note advised not to use this method. I’m on Windows 8.1 Pro x64 and everything worked perfectly. I had to use this to be able to unlock the bootloader and flash ubersonic RC3 rom on a inactive HTC Evo 4G. Without this, I couldn’t even use the android sdk toolkit to adb fastboot into the device as windows would give errors that the device isn’t recognized.

‘When the machine starts, select “Disable driver signature enforcement”. Your machine will start with Driver signing enforcement disabled until the next reboot. Once logged in, open Device Manager (win + r “devmgmt.msc”) and locate the entry under Other devices for an Unknown device, to find the correct one, double click on the entry for the unknown device view the details tab. Make sure it has the VID_8086.’…

‘Other Devices’ does not show up in my list!! Please help as I have completed everything correctly up until this point but now there is a big yellow ‘!’ next to the USB!

I had this same issue but had to restart the computer after installing it to get it work. Only way i could shut down the computer was to manually hold down the power button till it shut down. But when it came back on it worked.

GREAT! Thanks! I spent all day trying to fix my mum’s windows laptop (I am a mac os girl..) from various issues mainly linked to windows 8.1! and then came up with this usb 3.0 issue which has caused me no end of headache! Wow great and clear instructions! You allow me to now actually sleep tonight! Thanks! 🙂

At first i though it will not work as i was tired of trying every possible fix and not worked, but this, this surprisingly worked as a charm… i might even do a video tutorial with these instructions… thank you whoever posted this, i love you man . thank you, thank you, thank you………

I have an Asus G750 notebook with Intel i7 processor, don’t know how to find out what the chipset is. The OS is Windows 8.0 Pro. There are four USB 3 ports. The device manager shows an Intel 3.0 eXtensible host controller and USB root hub (xHCI), among other devices. I need to instal the Intel Windows 7 drivers on the offchance it might get my USB video capture device working. I’ve followed the instructions on this page, and I can get the eXtensible controller driver to update to the Intel version 1.0.6.245, but the xHCI root hub driver doesn’t update – it stays with the Microsoft driver, version 6.2.9200.16728. The two don’t work together! So I seem to be stuck. Does anyone have any further suggestions?

After searching and searching and trying all solutions including the one above I finally decided to check the BIOS. I ended up disabling the XHCI setting in BIOS and now everything works as new. Please try this first before wasting time. My disc reads perfectly and transfers with no issues.

i cant get this to work… when i try to instal the .ini file i say that i “have disk” etc and then when it tries to instal from that file it says there was an error updating the driver (error 10) (i think)….. and it wont let me continue 🙁

I was getting the same error code as Ky (2 September). I suspect your fix only works for the Intel C216 chipset. My Asus ROG750 notebook has the C220 set. Can you provide modified .inf files for C220, or advise me how to go about modifying the existing .inf files (after first backing them up, of course)?

After in install the first inf driver, usb ports freeze and so no keyboard or mouse. i had to force power down the PC by press and holding the power button. If i start the PC now, mouse or keyboard doesnt work. i had to use the windows 8.1 DVD to do a system restore. Any suggestions please?

After i install the first inf driver, usb ports freeze and so no keyboard or mouse. i had to force power down the PC by press and holding the power button. If i start the PC now, mouse or keyboard doesnt work. i had to use the windows 8.1 DVD to do a system restore. Any suggestions please?

Hi,
I have a problem, It works well as your instruction, but when I restart computer, it doesn’t work again, I checked device manager, it seems everything is fine, but just doesn’t work after restart computer.
how to solve it?

For those of you stuck after the second reboot with advanced settings because there is no more working USB host, so no keyboard control, just turn off your computer then start again. Then go back to device manager and restore previous version of the hardware you updated after the first reboot with advanced settings.
For me, it magically reset the native driver and everything is working fine now, I can use my USB 3.0 ports

Great job! This is for Intel c220 chipset and is working fine. I search for this about 2 months and destroyed 2 USB 3.0 pendrives when looking for solution. Earlier with ChipGenius software I’v got the message that my usb 3.0 working as… usb 2.1, and now I have no problem. THANK YOU very much 🙂

I am trying to do this for Windows 8.1 64-bit. Gee, I must be doing something wrong… When I do “Have Disk” , select the updated file, and ignore the Microsoft warnings about the digital signature, the Device Manager shows the USB 3 is not working. Then After the 2nd reboot when I check the device manager I don’t see a listing for “OTHER”….

This solution didn’t work on my Win 8.1 with C220 Chipset (I got error code 10), but I found information about modification .ini files:
“In Drivers\win7\x64 edit iusb3hub.inf and iusb3xhc.inf by copying the information under [Intel.NTAMD64.6.1] to directly below [Intel.NTAMD64.6.2]”

Installing both .ini fiiles according plugable.com instruction with this modification works pefectly. Maybe it will help someone.

Thought i found this as a solution and did not read the Comments:
My Win8.1 freezes and i just spend 4 Hours to work on a solution!!
Please update the article and write that i doesnt work anymore, and that shit would not cost me about 6 hours of my life!
Hope that a ps2 Keyboard and mouse help me to loggin and correckt the mistake but where to get on at these days!
THX to the author for not updating his article and stealing me Time and verves!
THX!

I did everthing written in the article and my Win8.1 X64 freezed from the first moment i installed the: •iusb3hub.inf.
Had to to a hard shutdown and now i can not loggin any more, because alle USB ports are deactivated!

What can i do now?

Will a PS/2 mouse and Keyboard work, my Motherboard would have these ports?
How can i logging and deactivate this •iusb3hub.inf and go back to the original Settings?
What can i do?

I tried everything with Windows repair function despite of Setting back the System because i fear to loose a lot of data!

HELP please, bythe way i think that this article should Content the advice that you might destroy an working System!

If you can get to the Device Manager (Windows button + r, then type “devmgmt.msc”) then select the USB devices and double click the USB 3.0 device, then in the “Driver” tab select “Uninstall”. Then reboot, and the PC will automatically reinstall the built-in Microsoft driver for USB that’s part of Win 8.1. (I’m on a laptop so I can use my built-in cursor pad, not sure if this helps you though…)
-N

Thank you very much. I’m using a Sony Vaio fit and this is the only solution that has worked for me. Also i wanted to know if there was some way I could get better transfer speeds. The max I can get right now is about 59mb/s. Thank you once again!

Hi David — For your system, you’ll want to ignore the post above. It looks like your system is a USB 2.0 EHCI system, and that works fine as-is with the Microsoft stack. The post above only concerns Intel’s USB 3.0 generation XHCI controllers, won’t work on older ECHI controllers, and wouldn’t have anything to offer anyway.

For people with Intel XHCI controllers (USB 3.0 systems purchased in the last few years), there are definitely some substantial pros and cons of the Intel developed stack (the one highlighted in this post) and the Microsoft stack (the one in Windows 8). But they’re pretty complex to untangle, so at this point it’s best to leave well enough alone in most cases.

That said, in addition to performance differences, one area that’s particularly tricky is in how each stack deals with the endpoint and device limits of Intel’s current XHCI controller. The XCHI controller built into the current generation chipsets supports significantly fewer devices and endpoints than their USB 2.0 generation EHCI controllers did. But there are some software tricks you can do to compensate a little. Our impression is Intel does some of these tricks in their stack, while Microsoft does a more straight-on implementation. We’re going to have a new blog post in the coming week or two exploring device limits (host controller resource issues) in depth and making recommendations.

Hi Bernie,
I have an MSi GT70 ONE laptop running Windows 8.1 and a plugable 7 port hub. It is the Intel 7 series chipset. Up until a few weeks ago I was able to connect my USB 3.0 drives through the hub and use them. All of a sudden that all changed. Now, they will spin up and appear to connect for a moment and you can see the drive appear on My Computer and then after a few seconds you can hear the disconnect sound and the drive icon disappears. Then, shortly after, you hear a sound like it is connecting again but it never does. When looking on device manager I get (code 43) The USB set address request failed. The drives are appearing under the USB root hub xHCI that is running a Microsoft driver 6.3.9600.17731 date 3/16/2015. The drives are trying to run a Microsoft 6.3.9600.17238 date 6/21/2006….and to me that seems quite old for USB 3.0 but I may be wrong. Either way, the drives do not stay connected. I get the same problems if I plug the drives into the computer directly, although this has only started to happen since a few days back when I started having the hub issue because before that, everything worked. Now, if I plug the hub into a USB 2.0 port, everything works fine, even the USB 3.0 drives. So, it appears obvious that there is a USB 3.0 driver issue causing the problem and the hardware may need some sort of firmware update but that the root cause appears to be a Microsoft one. I may be wrong but it would be nice to get some input on this. Everything was fine, all of a sudden USB 3.0 has stopped working properly but 2.0 is fine. Also, the 3.0 ports can run 2.0 drives etc just fine so the physical hardware is working.

I have tried the firmware fix above, I have tried updating chipset drivers. I have uninstalled and reinstalled hardware and drivers a thousand times and nothing is working. I must get these drives working so I can process my photo projects and USB 2.0 would just be a time wasting drag. Can you please advise what is the latest knowledge on this issue and what to do?

Pat, do you know anyone on W10? See if the drives register as USB3 on a W10 machine. If yes, maybe take advantage of the free W10 update. Do a search to ensure it doesn’t break any of your work-production software first though.

Bernie – thanks for your quick and informative response.
But I wish to emphasize (per my two posts above) that my Win 8.1 machine shows both USB 3 and USB 2 “devices” in device manager and that my machine has both USB2 and USB 3 sockets. Further, my particular USB 3 “devices” seem to be the subject of this thread.
Just want to be sure I’m getting the most out of my USB 3 ports and “devices”.
Same advice, or should i take any steps? Thanks.

Bernie – sorry for repeat reply (see below (?)), but my Optiplex 7010 on Win 8.1 shows BOTH USB 2 and USB 3 “devices” (per my two posts directly above) , and it has BOTH USB2 and 3 socket-ports.
Since I’d like the USB 3 to work as well as possible, should I try to do something with the USB 3 entries? Thanks.

I would also suggest updating the post to show device manager in “View Devices by Connection” mode so you can see what devices are connected to the Intel USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller. If all of your devices are including keyboard and mouse move them to a different controller. If you don’t have a different controller don’t use this solution as none of your devices will work (of course you can use PS/2 if you have that choice).

I hope someone sees my comment.
I have an external SSD that is disconnecting and reconnecting to my laptop, and I tried every fix I could find online with no luck. I found this page and it is very interesting!

I got to the point where I was going to check that the VID_8086 text was in the driver. Oddly enough, it wasn’t. The closest I could find was VEN_8086, so I just tried proceeding and see what happens. Turns out, it failed at installing in the next step. I just gave up, uninstalled the driver, scanned for hardware changes and reinstalled the old driver.

Unless somebody has a fix for this to give me, I am just so frustrated that it doesn’t work and I will just give up at this point.

I still want to thank you for making this page, it seems to have helped a lot of people! It’s just unfortunate that it didn’t work for me. And yes, I followed every step closely and correctly until the VID_8086 point. Such a shame, I really wanted my external drive to work!

Either way, thanks! If anyone does have time to help me, then thank you, but if not, then have a good day! 🙂

I have the same problem with external SSD and I’m also frustrated. I got to the point where I’m instaling from the disk for the first time iusb3xhc.inf. The message appers: “Windows encountered a problem instaling the driver software for your device. … found… but encountered an error while attempting to instal it. Intel(R) USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller. The device cannot start. (Code 10). If you know the manufacturer of your device, you can visit its website…” I have tried everything… I really need help 😐

I was stuck with my Iomega Prestige 1Tb basically only able to read when plugged into a USB 3.0 port.
I could write only plugging it on a USB 2.0 port. Unbelievable.
The terrible thing was Lenovo acquired Iomega and the support for Windows 8 was discontinued.
The guys on the Lenovo forum couldn’t help me and when I googled for the last time finding this blog here I was not so confident.
But your help was great!

Thanks a lot! And Damn Microsoft and their buggy Windows 8 XHC driver…together with Iomega Windows 8 lack of support.

Hi there
i have tried this solution for the Windows 10 technical preview because the mircosoft driver Version 10.0.10041.0 blocks the sharing with Android devices…
Sadly it doesnt work…
What can i modify in both .inf to get it working??

If I own Acer VN7-591G which has ONLY USB3.0 ports, I am stuck and I can’t change these xHCI drivers? I do have USB2.0 hub in my monitor but I guess that won’t help as it must be connected to laptop’s usb 3.0 port eventually.

I do not have any problems with my drivers. I have USB 3.0 enclosure and USB 2.0 enclosure. They both work flawlessy. No disconnect, no data corruption. Myabe they are just a little bit slow -copying from my system SSD to that 3.0 enclosure should be at least 100MB/s, but I get only 55MB/s. I can live with that.

My problem is that each time I am trying to burn a CD using external LiteON USB burner, my device disconnects, there is an error while burning and then reconnects again.

Thanks so much! This solved my problem perfectly. I have a Lenovo Ideapad S400 whose USB 3.0 port stopped working with a WD Passport ext HDD a few Windows updates ago (Win 8.1 x64), and it was intermittent before that I think. Thanks for sharing!

I had the same issue on fresh Windows 10 and USB 3.0 HDD Toshiba STOR.E PARTNER 1TB. I had installed all proper drivers and so I had among others Intel drivers for USB and Intel drivers for SATA AHCI.
Drive was connecting and disconnecting every few seconds and thus was unusable. I had tried every trick short of buying plain USB3 Hub to filter U1/U2 sleep commands send to the USB drive.

It may not be logical but as last thing I tried uninstalling “AHCI Intel(R) Rapid Storage Technology Driver” (iaStorA.sys) from Intel to original Windows 10 driver and IT WORKED!!!

USB HDD started to work properly on drivers from Windows 10 “Intel(R) USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller – 1.0 (Microsoft)” ver. 10.0.10240.16461. I even enabled again power management on USB xhci and root hub drivers and enabled USB Selective Suspend in power settings.
I don’t really know what SATA controler driver has to do with USB Host Controller not working properly but it seems it does.

2) those drivers come with these folders, once you unzip them:
Controller Driver – as first
Hub Driver – as second

3) you do the same procedure as described in this post! BUT BEWARE:
I had mouse and keyboard plugged into the USB 2.0 ports on the back of my MoBo. Both are gone after I updated the drivers from Microsoft to Intel eXtensible. So I had to plug the mouse on a USB 3.0 port on the back and it was recognized again! But I'm not sure all the ports work, as I did this procedure many times before and I recall other ports didn't let me recognize the mouse anymore!

4) Once the mouse is up and running, you can restart Windows and then update the usb root hub driver as described here.
Suddenly the iomega portable disk attached to the front USB hub 3.0 is recognized again and so the keyboard. I moved back my mouse in the same USB 2.0 ports hub.
Try copying a small file to the portable disk and YES it works..Try a bigger file and YES it works!

Messing around trying to fix this issue and failing more and more times, brought me to unplug the drive from the USB port while it was stuck (calculating how much time to write a simple file onto disk), maximum frustration then as I basically couldn't access anymore my portable HDD….

I managed to save my backup using Isobuster and extracting everything to my internal HDD.
Luckily I didn't lose any file. But there was no way to make Windows to read the disk anymore. Then I formatted the disk and now I'm moving back again the backup. But at least now it's working as it should.

What I see now analyzing the device manager, is that before the iomega Prestige, under USB 3.0 was seen as "USB Attached SCSI (UAS) Mass Storage Device", now no more. It's seen as if it was attached to a USB 2.0 port, together with a Virtual CD USB unit (typical of iomega portable HDD).

I followed Chris Delpinsky’s instructions for a Macbook Pro (13inc, mid 2012) with a series 6 Intel chipset running Windows 10 and it worked with the modded Intel USB 3.0 drivers. I did not have to go through the replacement step as in the original instructions. One thing to note, the USB ports will work when you have the USB device plugged in when booting up but won’t if the device is already on when you plug in the device. To resolve this, right click on the USB root hub in device manager and untick the option for “allow the computer to turn off this device to save power”. This seemed to sort out Windows not powering up USB devices after it was already booted.

I had the same/similar USB port loss-problem with my HP Pavilion 11-n010dx x360 laptop with Windows 8.1, and I didn’t have the aforementioned problem-Windows Update (or its ‘child’ updates) to begin with. I also found that I would lose my USB ports- yet inconsistently so -when either other Windows Updates had been installed or I simply placed a certain microSD plug- w/ its USB adapter -into one of the USB ports (I guess the system couldn’t handle the shock of an 8GB microSD?). I believe I have reason to really suspect that the USB drivers (and the reluctance of the manufacturer to advance them for the 8.1 OS…) are really at the root of the problem but, anyway, here’s how I remedied this:

Workaround/Remedy: Manually reinstall the driver.
1. Open Control Panel, Device Manager to check for your USB device(s) listed as ‘Unknown’ under “Other” devices, and take note of the spec’s. i.e.:
Properties: Intel(R) USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller – 0100 (Microsoft)
Status: The drivers for this device are not installed. (Code 28)
Driver version: 6.3.9600.17797
Event info. (the earliest dated *.inf file): 7/23/15 “Device configured (usbhub3.inf)”
2. Search your system to find the usbhub3.inf file location –I found it within C:\Windows\WinSxS subfolders.
3. Right-click the ‘Unknown’ (USB) item and choose the “Update Driver Software…” option,
4. Choose “Browse my computer for driver software”, as it won’t be found on-line, and “Browse…” then navigate to the ‘parent’ folder for your *.inf files (it was the C:\Windows\WinSxS for me) and check the “Include subfolders” box then “Next” to install the driver(s) and fix the USB problem.

Notes:
1. There will be MANY sub-folders to the WinSxS folder -I believe the ones you are most interested in for the USB ports have folder names similar to beginning with “amd64_usb” and include versioning like “6.3.9300” plus either “17238”, “17731”, and/or “18088” for actually up to 3 different ‘Unknown’ or missing USB devices.
2. I determined that my system had two (2) of these “amd64_usb” sub-folders for each of three (3) ‘Unknown’/missing USB devices, and so I copied these (6) subfolders into my “C:\Downloads\HP Drivers\USB\USB_3.0_eXtensible_Host_Controller_Driver” folder to isolate them for any future possible necessary use. (And I actually updated-fixed my laptop from only them –not from C:\Windows\WinSxS).
3. I’m not yet sure that this is a permanent solution, but I got my USB ports back real fast a couple days ago and it’s been good since.
4. This issue still prompted me to resize down my drive in preparation to configure this laptop as a dual-boot system with a good Linux distro (probably Zorin for its Windows look-alike elements) -for the day Microsoft really advances their OSs to be incompatible w/ this little laptop.

As of Windows 10 in March of 2016, this issue remains unresolved by either Microsoft or Intel. Last month I bought a brand new top of the line convertible laptop (Lenovo Yoga) and, not knowing of this issue, fought with it for a couple of weeks to be able to copy large numbers of files (700Gb of music archives) between two USB drives. Either using Syncovery or direct copy, the operations kept failing, when I’ve been running it successfully on an older HP laptop. I almost returned the Lenovo laptop until my research led me here and I understood that the issue was not with Lenovo but with the “spat” between Microsoft and Intel over who’s responsible for ensuring that device drivers actually work.

I need this machine and can’t afford to mess things up with registry edits and behind-the-scene tweaks, so I’ll have to wait until a working driver is available, and keep using my old Win 7 system to do my archiving.

What a shame that these two companies can’t cooperate; they’ll end up pushing me and others to use Apple products.

To very smart folks here: How do I test my USB 3 slots on my Win 10 Pro 64-bit PC to see whether or not I have an issue?
It’s a Dell Optiplex 7010 Mini-Tower with 16GB RAM and two 500 GB hard drives. I’m actually dual-booting Win 7 Pro SP1 64-bit and Win 10 Pro 64-bit, and right now there are none or very few Errors or Warnings in Event Viewer for either one on each reboot. And looking at the USB 3-related entries in Device Manager, nothing has a yellow signal.
But my question goes only to USB 3 when I’m in Win 10 Pro 64-bit – how do I test to see whether I have any issues with the USB 3?
Thanks.

After following that instruction on my windows 10 it is now all working as it should. Before this the transfer to usb hdd would go up to 40mb/s then drop to 0mb/s then go back up and down. Now it runs at steady 112mb/s and it works even better than on windows 7 where it would be up 80mb/s. Super happy with the result and big big thank you to the the person who managed to find this solution.